I used to own the Nikon 18-200mm VR lens and itís pretty good but very soft at anything less than f9 from 100mm upwards. I bought this lens, cheaply, as part of a kit when I upgraded my camera and Iíve done a few tests on it. The 18-140mm at 140mm is amazingly sharp wide open, way better than the 18-200mm was. The VR works as well as it did on the 18-200mm. Even the bokeh is reasonable although still quite busy compared to a decent fast prime.